


Nodus Tollens

by Miss_Vile



Series: The Summer of Smut [12]
Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Frottage, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:41:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25230298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miss_Vile/pseuds/Miss_Vile
Summary: nodus tollensn. the realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore—that although you thought you were following the arc of the story, you keep finding yourself immersed in passages you don’t understand, that don’t even seem to belong in the same genre—which requires you to go back and reread the chapters you had originally skimmed to get to the good parts, only to learn that all along you were supposed to choose your own adventure.
Relationships: Oswald Cobblepot/Edward Nygma
Series: The Summer of Smut [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1787152
Comments: 8
Kudos: 63





	Nodus Tollens

**Author's Note:**

> "Nodus Tollens" comes from [The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows.](https://www.dictionaryofobscuresorrows.com/)

It was easier to call it a daydream. His insides vibrated like static. Bees buzzed around in a honeycomb built between his ribs, congregating around the queen— or _King,_ in this instance— caged within his heart.

Ed isn't certain when it started. If he took the time to think on it, he could argue that it happened on Grundy Street. When one too many bottles of wine resulted in his mind pondering the what-if as he watched a bead of burgundy liquid dribble from the corner of his friend's mouth and down the curve of his jawline.

As for when he _knew_ , it was the evening Oswald came home after overseeing the situation with Isabella:

_"It's done," Oswald walked through the doorway, but Ed had barely noticed—_ _too wrapped up in his own self-flagellation over the fact that he hadn’t seen her manipulations sooner._

_Ed looked up at him but couldn't bring himself to smile. The blood on Oswald's cuff told him that his friend had dealt with her demise himself. It made his chest flutter knowing that he had taken care of the matter personally. He’d been eager to do so and withheld no reservations about that fact. Panic_ \- _stricken, Ed had informed him about how she’d stepped into the light of her apartment dressed as Miss Kringle and Oswald had been livid ever since._

_"Is there anything more I can do for you, my friend?" Oswald asked, hesitantly taking his hand into his own._

_"No… Thank you."_

_Oswald leaned forward and kissed him on top of his head. Ed looked up at him, uncertain how to respond to such tenderness._

_He finally remembered to breathe once he heard Oswald close the door to his bedroom upstairs._

The constant near-kisses only added to his suffering. Each moment of denial of what had always been there tightened the vice around his insides. The torture was slow. Agonizing. Ed wasn’t certain how long he would last before he caved.

He worked from his home office more than he did City Hall— further creating that cavernous divide and bellowing dark that threatened to swallow them. It granted him solitude but it also left his mind to daydream about what _could_ be. Hallucinations resembling ghosts would act out each path they might have taken: a kiss instead of a hug, a dinner, a confession Ed had always suspected, gentle touches without the painful restraint...

Ed assumed that life with Oswald wasn’t the path Fate had in store for him. He couldn’t fathom the idyllic life in the countryside with a mint-green house, children, and the family dog. Domestic bliss was the promised land for good people and, though they may be honest criminals, they were far from good.

After Isabella, Ed no longer saw himself capable of pursuing the life he promised to partake in for the sake of the Nashton’s— Not like he had an obligation to do so since leaving them behind. He’d already failed his mother. The vision of her disappointed expression as he cradled Miss Kringle in his arms haunted him. Frustratingly, his perception of self-worth was directly linked to whether or not his life made some Evangelical woman in a hole in the ground proud. Those were shackles he was too insecure to break.

Perhaps, with time, he could pull himself from the inky water that threatened to drown him. If he closed his eyes, he could almost see Oswald standing on the shore holding out his hand. Ed took in another lungful of salty brine.

Food tasted wrong. Colors were less vibrant. Gotham seemed far bleaker and bereft of life with each passing day. None of that was Oswald’s doing, of course. All the man had to do was dip his toes into the water and Gotham would spring back to life. Or, at the very least, Ed’s perception of it would. He could sense the oncoming storm— The battle for his sense of self was dangling on a knife’s edge... and Oswald held that knife firmly in his grasp.

“Ed...” Oswald shifted his weight on his cane, “How long are you going to be like this?”

“I'm sorry to be such an inconvenience to you,” Ed forced himself into a sitting position, the macrame quilt still firmly affixed to his trembling shoulders.

“No... Ed, I... ugh,” he groaned and rubbed at his temple, “Do not apologize. I'm being selfish. You're grieving. I, of all people, should understand.”

“I don't entirely know what I'm grieving,” Ed said with a furrowed brow, “I just feel…”

Ed’s mouth hung open as he fixated on a small indentation on the wall. Salt and bitterness coated the roof of his mouth with each inhale.

Oswald sat next to him on the couch, “I’ve never seen you unable to find the right words.”

“I may be born of luck or provincial circumstance, but the writing on the wall remains the same. What am I?”

“Fate,” Oswald answered with a nod.

“I used to believe in it,” Ed’s voice was low, like he was hiding from something.

“I recall,” a smile tugged at the corner of his lips, “You said it was fate that we met.”

“I used to justify the circumstances of my life by telling myself I was destined for more. That all of the pain I experienced and… _caused_ would be worth it.”

“I thought much the same growing up,” he said.

“And you ended up being right,” Ed smiled at his friend, “Look at you. You have everything you could have ever wanted from life.”

“Well, most everything,” Oswald shied away and stared at the small gap between them on the couch.

“I still want to believe that Fate has more in store for me,” Ed worried his bottom lip between his teeth.

“But?” Oswald’s grip tightened on the head of his cane.

“But... somewhere along the way, the path that I thought Fate had for me got lost. The narrative that I locked myself into vanished but I hadn't even realized I'd strayed that far.”

“And what narrative was that?”

“That I was capable of having a normal life,” he shook his head, “That someday I would just... stop being... _me._ That I could finally be someone worth something and I could fall in love and have that kind of life.”

“Don’t say such things,” Oswald placed his hand over Ed’s knee, “You are worth more to me than you could ever know. And, even if you didn’t already know that, you don’t need me to validate your worthiness. You don’t need anyone to do that for you. Just yourself.”

Edward placed his hand on top of Oswald’s— the pad of his thumb grazing over the peaks of his knuckles— before looking up at him. Their eyes locked and neither man dared look away.

“It could be that I was just reading the wrong chapter,” Ed heard himself say, falling face-first into the margins of a dangerous fairytale.

Oswald’s lips parted. His eyes sparkled with so much hope that Edward thought his heart might break. The moment was reminiscent of that time after the Siren’s. Ed’s throat felt tight.

“You've been pretty quiet about all of this,” he blinked, apprehensive and unsteady.

“What am I supposed to say, Ed?” Oswald’s gaze broke away.

“I don’t know… _Anything,”_ Ed clenched his teeth, “Call me a fool. Tell me I’m a moron for believing her. Remind me that I’m weak—”

“—You are none of those things!” Oswald scolded, “How were you supposed to know she was some _crazed fangirl?”_

_“You_ knew.”

“No, I didn’t trust her but I had no way of knowing how far gone she was,” he shook his head and crinkled his nose at the thought of her, “The woman got surgery to look more like your Miss Kringle. She was insane.”

Ed shivered. Isabella had been too good to be true. Oh, how presumptuous he was to have thought she could be his second chance— a redemption, of sorts. Desperation clung to him like a second skin as he sank further into the lie. Seduced by her face and voice and _riddles._ It was obvious now, of course, how blind he’d been. Oswald warned him not to trust her but he refused to listen. It wasn’t until he found her stash of murder memorabilia that he finally came to his senses.

“I never did ask what you did with her,” Ed couldn’t hide his guilty smirk, “I assume you threw her in the river with the rest of those who were stupid enough to cross us since you’ve become Mayor.”

“No, I didn’t want to poison the fish. Now, the _worms_ on the other hand,” he chuckled, “Incidentally, that’s why we’ll be needing a new meat grinder.”

They shared a laugh at that. Oswald always seemed to know just the thing to say— that perfect blend of disturbing macabre that they both not-so-secretly reveled in.

“I’m just sorry we couldn’t have intercepted her sooner,” Oswald sighed.

“It’s probably what I deserved,” Ed said.

Articles written in the Gotham Gazette and tabloids painted him as some sort of sadistic mad man. Oswald told him to pay them no mind, but it was hard to deny their claims when there was so much blood on his hands. Not that he regretted it, necessarily. The skeletons in his closet led him to where he was today. It just wasn’t the road he had expected to travel down.

“Stop. No more of this,” Oswald placed a reassuring hand on Edward’s shoulder, “This is why you’ve been like this for weeks now. It won’t get any better until you stop beating yourself up over it.”

“No doubt you’re right,” Ed found it easier to smile when Oswald was this close, “Thank you, Oswald.”

“Anytime,” Oswald smiled and looked down at where his hand was still connected at Ed’s shoulder.

Delicately, his thumb grazed across the side of his neck and up towards his jaw. The sharpness of his enameled fingernail made Ed’s skin prickle, but he was too lost in the feeling to move away. Warmth spread over his face as the palm of Oswald’s hand cradled him just below his ear. Ed’s eyes fluttered closed as he leaned into his touch.

He opened his eyes and saw Oswald looking back at him— his eyes darting back and forth, searching for the answers to his unasked questions. Ed felt his idle fingers tremble against his flushed skin. With a sigh, he pulled away and headed back towards his desk.

They had dinner together, as they often did, but each man was his own island. The valley between them was a dark, daunting maw awaiting them below. Trapped together— intimately and cautiously— but also separately caged.

They filled the void between them with idle chatter about work. The new casino was scheduled to break ground soon. Criminals in Gotham’s Underworld were already lining up to stake their claim in the lucrative business venture their beloved mayor was creating under the table. Barbara Kean attempted to ask for more than she’d earned, which proved troublesome. They suspected that she would likely betray them the moment she found a crack in their armor. Ed refused to provide any such opportunity for her and instead doubled his efforts to dismantle what little power she had.

Edward busied himself with work. He remained ever-vigilant in his duties as Chief of Staff. The tedium was rather therapeutic, if he was honest. The clacking of the typewriter on his desk and the smell of ink and gunpowder acted like a balm for his raw nerves.

Forty-eight hours into a work binge left him curled up on the couch. He’d only planned to rest his eyes for a moment but had somehow managed to fall asleep. Oswald approached him with an amused huff.

“Sleeping on the couch cannot be comfortable,” Oswald poked him with the end of his cane, “Your legs are far too long.”

Ed stretched and sprawled his limbs out like a cat. With a yawn, he threw his arm over his eyes to shield them from the offending light. Oswald spoiled him with a decent set of curtains when he moved into the mansion and it made him wonder how he _ever_ managed to get a good night’s sleep with a bright neon sign blinking outside his window.

“You're so dramatic,” Oswald chuckled when all Ed did was groan in response to his playful prodding.

“That's why you love me.”

There is silence. A beat. Though, for Ed, that vacuum was filled by the roar of blood rushing in his ears.

“I... misspoke,” Ed said, not lifting his arm away.

He didn't venture to look until he heard Oswald retreat down the hall. The distinctive sluggish gait of his friend sounded heavier than normal. Come to think of it, when was the last time _Oswald_ slept?

They kept sharing touches but they always recoiled like it hurt. Ed always averted his gaze and Oswald would return to the safety of his bedroom. Oswald never locked his door, though. Ed recalled hearing the clanking of his keys securing his bedroom door at night when he first came to the manor but, ever since the Siren’s, Oswald kept it unlocked.

“Oswald?” Ed’s knuckles gently rapped at the door. When he didn’t hear an answer, he slowly turned the handle. Normally, he’d walk in unannounced, but he was genuinely worried that something sharp and heavy would be thrown at him if he did. He cleared his throat, “May I come in?”

Oswald responded with a noncommittal noise, but Ed took that as enough permission to proceed…

He was sitting on the edge of his bed, facing away from the dor, with a cigarette between his fingers. A crystal ashtray was overflowing with greying ash and yellowed filters on his bedside table. Ed wrinkled his nose.

“Sorry,” Oswald snuffed out the cherry.

“You know that’s bad for you.”

Oswald rolled his eyes, “I don’t need you scolding me like I’m a damn child. Besides… it helps calm my nerves.”

“I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No, Ed,” he stood up and faced him, “It’s not you. I’m just tired.”

“Is there anything I could do to help?” Ed took a step forward.

“I’m not even entirely certain how to answer that,” he huffed.

“I could clear your schedule for the rest of the day,” Ed was standing in front of him now, “Maybe help you relax?”

“Relax?” he scoffed, “How in the hell am I supposed to relax when you keep looking at me like…”

“Like what?” Ed swallowed the lump in his throat.

“Do not insult me by playing dumb.”

“I’m not playing dumb,” Ed’s face fell, “I just don't know what I’m supposed to do.”

Unthinking, Ed fiddled with his friend’s tie pin. Rose gold with an emerald. A gift he'd given his friend after the Mayoral race. He tried to lose himself in the shimmering emerald but Oswald kept him from drowning by wrapping his fingers around his wrist.

“We can’t,” Ed spoke, his tongue swollen with regret.

“Why?” Oswald’s voice was small as he buried his nose into the fabric of Ed’s suit jacket.

“Love is a weakness,” he clenched his fists before placing them on Oswald’s waist.

“You really still believe that?”

“Someone will take advantage of this,” Ed’s grip tightened.

“I’ll die of heartbreak long before then,” he trailed a knuckle against Ed’s cheek, “Please, Ed. We’re falling apart like this. Neither of us can sleep. Why pretend?”

“I don’t want to lose you,” Ed’s lips hovered over Oswald’s, “I want to hold onto you just a little while longer.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“But opening this chapter means the book is almost over.”

Oswald scoffed, “If you want to impress me with poetry, do so while kissing me.”

Ed slotted his mouth against Oswald’s and balled his fists in frustration at how perfectly they fit together. He didn’t realize how weak his knees were until he felt Oswald’s arms wrap around him.

“I’ve got you,” Oswald whispered. Desperate, Ed kissed him again.

His mind evaporated. It was like he was watching the scene unfold like one of his hallucinations. Each time he thought he would float away, Oswald would touch him or kiss him and bring him back. Oswald’s lips kept him tethered.

His hands wandered— exploring their own narrative separate from his own conscious mind. Oswald’s hands followed. Deft fingers trailed over the expensive linen of his suit and made Ed shiver. He wanted to scream. To cry. To beg him to stop because this was wrong and giving in would ruin them. It didn’t matter that they were each other’s complement or that they finished the other’s sentences or could see home in their eyes. People like them weren’t meant for it. Their story would end in tragedy— Either a bullet in a back alley or gut-wrenching betrayal.

Oswald tasted different than how Ed imagined it. The tang of nicotine coated his lips and left him hazy. Weren’t kisses supposed to be sweet?

The backs of Ed’s knees collided with the bedframe and sent him tumbling backwards. Oswald, not breaking stride, seized the opportunity and straddled him. He leaned forward to kiss him with more insistence as ed threaded his fingers through his hair.

Ed could feel his friend’s growing arousal through their pants and bucked his hips forward. Oswald moaned into his mouth and returned the gesture in kind— grinding in slow, agonizing circles.

They groaned as Ed placed his hand on Oswald’s lower back and pressed them closer together. The strain of their goins within the confines of their pants was slowly growing uncomfortable. Oswald winced as he shifted the weight off of his bad leg. Ed used that as an excuse to roll him over onto his back and claim his neck with a loving bite. He suckled at the soft skin until he tasted copper. He pulled away and licked his lips.

Light trickled in through the part in the curtains, highlighting their naked limbs as they tangled together. Their faces remained in shadow but their cocks slotted together with Oswald’s hand wrapped around them was vividly illuminated. The intimacy was perfectly framed and highlighted as if to mock Ed’s denial of it.

Ed watched as Oswald’s thumb rubbed over the tips of their cocks— smearing pre-cum over the sensitive skin— and Ed bucked his hips into his hand. Oswald’s moans bellowed at the back of his throat while Ed’s became shorter and higher pitched. Lightning shot up his spine and made his toes curl. His atoms pulled in retrograde. Like his whole life was spinning in reverse just so he could watch it all play out for him over and over again until he finally understood what it all meant.

“Ed?”

“Hmm?” Ed’s eyes felt heavy.

“We can’t keep doing this.”

Ed felt like the air had been forced from his lungs. He was finally starting to feel like everything was making sense. Why was Oswald putting an end to it now? His hands grasped for purchase onto the rumpled sheets and on Oswald’s skin, but he couldn’t hold off the impending panic.

“Shh… Ed,” Oswald held his face, calming him instantly, “What I mean is that we can’t keep hiding from one another. I love you and I don’t want to spend another day thinking that my love is going to hurt you.”

Ed kissed him in response. He pulled away and smiled at how his lover’s eyes shined in the dark. All fog had lifted and all cages unlocked. He kissed him a few more times, lazily, as the two of them drifted into a comfortable sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> For April... I guess. Live long and prosper, you dumbass raccoon.


End file.
